Richmond great Jack Riewoldt has backed a “combative” Damien Hardwick amid claims the triple premiership coach has lost some of his passion.
The Tigers are languishing in the bottom four having won just one game all season, hitting a low point with last Sunday’s dour loss to Gold Coast.
But Hardwick was firm in his response to the suggestion he’s lost interest at his press conference on Thursday, quipping: “it’s easy to sit there and say those comments when they’re sitting behind a desk – come and say it to my face”.
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“Yeah I do (have the passion to coach), it was just one of those games where you couldn’t seem to get anything to go, or anything to work and our players felt that as well, and that’s when you do feel flat.
“Look, did it come across a little bit like that? Yeah it probably did, but the fact of the matter is I was probably feeling like any supporter in this organisation, incredibly flat and frustrated with where we are at.
“But once I sit there in the cold hard light of day and review the tape and work through a few things, I feel a hell of a lot better.”
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That sort of energy was exactly what Hardwick has been showing at Punt Road as the Tigers plot a path back into finals contention, according to Riewoldt.
“I like this version of Dimma – the combative style,” the champion forward said on Fox Footy’s AFL 360 Plus.
“There’s a coaching version, and then he starts to come back to a little bit of the playing version of Damien Hardwick.
“We’re putting it right on the agenda we’re not playing the football we’d like to play; we’re 1-5, obviously played finals last year, yes we’ve been in games but we haven’t been able to win them. So a big game for us come Saturday (vs West Coast).”
Hardwick is the longest-serving coach in the AFL, having taken the helm at Richmond ahead of the 2010 season, and with the opening seven rounds of the season suggesting a decline is on the cards, many have asked whether his time is up.
But Riewoldt said: “I don’t know whether any coach has a certain (length of) tenure.
“People have different views – Kevin Sheedy coached for I think 26 years at Essendon. There’s a time and a finish on every coach’s career.
“Now I’ve been asked this question a little bit, does Dimma seem as interested? Because now the narrative is it’s time to move him along.
“He is really, really invested at the moment. You can just see that little spark in his eye which I can imagine if you played with him, you saw when he went over the white line. It’s there right now and he is trying to drag the group up and over the line.
“Yes we’ve got injuries but we still fundamentally believe we should be playing better footy than we are.”
